Saturday, September 8, 2007

Now about this Senator Craig thing.I just have really learned more than I needed to know about the behavior of guys in their restrooms. (Gay guys, anyway.)So I was talking about this with a friend who flies out of the Minneapolis airport regularly, and we asked her, have you seen this restroom? And she says, NO, there's TOO LONG A LINE! Of people rubbernecking the gay-guy-pick-up-restroom!She also added that this restroom is infamous on the Internet! Directions to it, descriptions of it, pictures of it, even, so you know which men's restroom to go to (although how pictures would help I have no idea, seeing as all airport restrooms look the same).Our conversation segued to the nastiness in general of guys' bathrooms, because guys are messy people, regardless of sexual orientation, and their bathrooms contain items called "urinals," and any item that shares a root with "urine" cannot be good.If Senator Craig were a woman, nothing like this could have ever happened.Not because women are so much cleaner than guys--I've been in some pretty nasty women's bathrooms--but because women's bathrooms are full of people who either 1) really need to go to the bathroom themselves, or 2) are helping other people who really need to go, these others being the women's small children. Or, people who 3) have had to wait so long to get a stall, all they can think about it not peeing their pants.As Jayme noted, if a hand appears under the stall in a women's bathroom, it means, "I need toilet paper quick!"And if there are any wide stances going on, it's because though there are two sets of feet in there, one belongs to a small child in there with her, and all she can think about is getting out of there quickly.I'm not sure what the conversation is in the men's john--well, except in the Senator Craig case--but I know what we talk about in the women's:"Are you next?""Is that one open?""No, honey, not that one, the next one.""Sorry, she/he really has to go." (Because half of all small children in the restroom are of the male type.)"Are you done?""No, sweetie, wait a second, it's my turn.""Move. Move over. Right there. Now don't move.""Let me help you pull them up.""Come here. Come here. Come here.""No. Wash your hands. Right here. Now.""Here's your towel, now dry.""We're almost done."And that's the adult end of conversations. Kid's restroom conversation often can't be recorded, like the time Caroline was in the stall with me, and she told me I had "a butt just like Daddy's."No, I don't.By the time women get into and out of the restroom we are so stressed, the thought of anything besides a glass of wine is just too much.So, now, how about you? What kind of potty talk are you thinkin' about?